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For Day Eight I'll talk about delegation, a tough topic for some people. Remember I mentioned in an earlier post that perfectionism equals less productivity? I mentioned to do your best work but don't harp over the small details.

So, let's talk about how to delegate:

Delegate some Tasks for Improved Productivity

There are several ways we can delegate our task list and those depend on our roles and jobs:

1. Parenting
As a parent, we spend so much time running around after the youngsters we feel like we never get anything done. Here's how to delegate effectively:

Assign age appropriate chores. Yes, they are never too young to start helping around the house. Here are a few ideas:

Food Prep. Get yourself a good slow cooker and prepare a bunch of frozen meals for the month (it only takes one day). Grab a package out of the freezer the night before, pop it in the cooker in the morning and forget it for the day. (Again you can have some of the kids prep some of it too).

Housecleaning. It doesn't matter if you work outside the home or are a stay-at-home mom - having someone come in once a month (or more often) to deep clean can really take a load off us. So, you and the kids can do the small weekly clean ups and delegate the harder stuff.

Shopping. Delegate this chore to Amazon! Use either their Amazon Pantry service or their Subscribe & Save service. Not only will you save money shopping there, you'll save a lot of time and stress by not having to struggle with the kids into the car, out of the car, in the store, and so on. Other options are Walmart Pick Up service (in some cities), just send a list, go in and pay and pick up your order.

2. Working
Whether we work from home or at an office, you can still delegate some chores:

​Outsource it. The small repetitive stuff can be outsourced either to a Virtual Assistant, to a Freelancer (onUpwork for example), or to someone on Fiverr. Small projects such as data entry, internet research, website management, phone calls, email management, etc.

Use Apps. Use different apps to help you stay focused and work faster. Such Apps as:

Doo - turns your to-do list into a stack of cards, so you can only concentrate on one task at a time.

Gorgias for Chrome - If you use Gmail on a Chrome browser, this extension is great. It allows you to drag and drop each email into different folders that have templates for various replies ready. Saves time typing out each generic reply.

Magic - Text your very own Concierge. It's a text app that you just text what you need and they'll work on it for you. For example "I need to fly to L.A." "cheapest or direct" "cheapest" "Ok I have one flight at 11am that's $351, OK?" "yes" "it's booked and check your email".

Simplify it. Like I said about outsourcing the repetitive stuff, you can also simplify it. Find a system that makes that "chore" easier and quicker. Work in "batches" instead of one whole project. For example if you're a writer or blogger - spend a chunk of time just writing articles and posts only. The next batch can be finding photos for each post, next is only email writing, and so on and so forth. So instead of working on one long post from start to finish, you've done several in the same amount of time. Create templates for each aspect of work you do so you just need to pull it up, change minor details and you're done. So, you haven't really delegated it out to someone else, but you got more done by using templates and batching.

So these are some ideas to get you started on delegating your work and making your life easier.

Just remember:

The K.I.S.S. Rule - Keep It Simple Stupid

and

​Don't Sweat The Small Stuff

What other ways do you delegate work out? Let me know in the comments please.